CALGARY, ALBERTA.: JUNE 21, 2013 -- Blake Wartenbe catches his wife Desiree as she jumps over flowing water in a flooded downtown Calgary, Alberta on June 21, 2013. For City story by ? (Leah Hennel/Calgary Herald)

Homes now lie in watery graves throughout Calgary, making for the equally watery eyes of the thousands of residents who are slowly returning home. But now a glimmer of hope emerges through this river of destruction as Calgarians show their resilience by taking action through the use of digital technology. In the midst of this disaster the city has encouraged people to stay out of the way of the authorities and danger itself. While still complying with the city’s requests, citizens have found a way to help their fellow Calgarians by communicating through multiple social media platforms.

Digital technology has empowered Albertan’s response to the traumatic flooding that left thousands of people displaced. Citizens are self-organizing using various social media platforms, and are ending up on sites like yychelps.ca, Calgary Clean-Up and Volunteer Calgary in only a matter of days after the initial devastation. People are learning how to tune-in and find ways to help while staying out of the way of the professionals.

Here are a few examples of how Calgarians are using social media tools to fight back against disaster:

Twitter and Facebook have allowed for information sharing about businesses that are providing free help and resources, such as sump pumps, water vacuums, building materials, and recycling drop off’s. Individuals are utilizing these platforms to discuss road closures, places of limited access and neighbourhoods that are in the most distress. People are also posting photos of incapacitated communities and areas to avoid. Moreover, these sites have facilitated conversation about when businesses or citizens are providing meals for the displaced. People are using hashtags to follow all of these stories and find resources: #abflood, #yycflood, #yychelps and #calgarystrong.

Furthermore, citizens are sharing videos and round-the-clock news updates from neighbourhoods around the city using YouTube and Vimeo. These sites also allow individuals the ability to access city press conferences.

During the floods, most electricity was turned off, meaning no access to television news. Social media platforms facilitated 24-hour wireless communication through any mobile device.

My favorite example of Calgarians coming together happened on June 24th. The city requested that volunteers meet at McMahon Stadium to be briefed for neighborhood re-entry support. This spread like wildfire over multiple social media sites. The city asked for 600, and in large part due to social media efforts, nearly 7000 eager volunteers arrived to help.

Being personally affected by this flood, I can say that having answers about my family, friends, home and belongings, regardless of how painful these answers may have been, did bring me solace. Calgarian’s use of social media helped me find these answers in a time of the unknown. While this flood wrought devastation and sadness for myself and countless Albertans, my pride in this province has grown because of it. The amount of compassion I have witnessed in the last week, as much from friends as from complete strangers, has been overwhelming. Gena Rotstein (@DexterityCon), founder of Place2Give said it best on June 24th– “The flood has revealed Calgary’s spirit of networked humanity.”

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